


Lost and Found - Reimagined

by Shaymed



Category: World of Warcraft
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-10
Updated: 2020-01-10
Packaged: 2021-02-27 07:16:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,033
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22193158
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shaymed/pseuds/Shaymed
Summary: This is a re-imagining of the story commissioned by Kristen, redone at her request. <3 Love ya, girl.





	Lost and Found - Reimagined

The orange lining the horizon as the sun said its final goodbye reflected from the beige of the limestone architecture. Blue luminescence peeked from beneath the weeping vines on the trees, shining down onto the grass and foliage below until the orange of the lamps halted its imposition. Nightborne gardeners knelt before shrubberies, clipping delicate stalks shorter to give the courtyard a subtle aesthetic continuity.

Adimara turned her gaze from the trickling water of the fountain and stared at the wide shoulders of the felguard walking beside his worgen master on all fours. Her nose scrunched and her pale lips migrated sideways. The only sounds in the vicinity were the _tick-tick, tick-tick_ of her claws on the stone floor and the _clomp, clomp_ of her own hooves keeping pace behind.

 _Stuck-up warlock,_ she thought. _Too proud to ask for directions. I would have had us reunited with our party ages ago._ She released a heavy sigh and folded her arms beneath her bosom.

The worgen looked back at her but said nothing and made no noise, then returned to scanning the path ahead. After a while, she gritted her sharp teeth together in her jowls. _Well, she’s not gonna say anything._ She pushed up to her full height, then turned her green eyes on the draenei. “Something on your mind?”

She pursed her lips. “Yes, worgen, someth—”

“Zaraphine.”

“Excuse me?”

She grinned, her sharp fangs glinting in the light. “My name.”

“I know your name, warlock.”

“Then use it?”

It wasn’t a suggestion, and Adimara knew it. She twisted her mouth sideways again and fiddled with a decorative icicle on her staff. Zaraphine snorted and turned, straightening to pop the length of her spine, then continued on.

“Okay, _draenei_ , what’s on your mind?” she asked. She eyed some nightborne in a garden area and adjusted her path to make sure they didn’t get too near.

“We are lost,” she said, pursing her lips at the other’s back.

“We’re taking a detour.” She sent a charming grin over her shoulder.

“No. You have gotten us lost.”

Zaraphine stopped and spun, causing Adimara to stumble on the hem of her robe. Her piercing green gaze held the draenei’s golden eyes for a long time before she smirked. “If you hadn’t followed me, then only _one_ of us would be lost.”

“If I had not followed you, then you would be _alone_ and lost.” Adimara straightened her unguligrade legs just enough to be able to look down into her eyes.

The warlock paused, then grinned wider and tilted her head. “That almost sounded like you care.”

She let out an impatient hiss and stomped around her, grinding her hooves into the cobblestone harder than necessary. “Do not be silly.”

She chuckled and fell into step behind her to silently follow as she huffed around as though she knew where she was going—though it was clear she was just as lost as the other.

“You had better not be staring at my tail,” she growled as she stomped an impatient hoof in a doorway.

“I wouldn’t dream of it,” she said, her lips parting into that charming grin. “Can’t say the same for what’s beneath it, though.”

Adimara spun on her, golden eyes wide. “Excuse yourself!”

“There is no excuse for me. Is there one for you?”

“I beg your pardon?”

She took her hand to lead her from the doorway and back into the courtyard. “You shouldn’t beg. It’s unbecoming of one such as you.”

A blueish flush graced the white skin of her cheekbones. “That almost sounded like a compliment.”

“Maybe it almost was.”

She conjured a table of pastries and grabbed a mana bun to shove into her mouth. She turned her head to hide the nervous blushing caused by her flattery. Zaraphine sniffed the floating table and took a few cakes from the plate. She set herself down to bite into them more delicately than a worgen’s snout allowed. Adimara glanced down at the sound of smacking mastication. She giggled into her fingertips.

“What?” she growled, her tongue lapping at some fondant stuck to the roof of her mouth.

“You have some cream…” She pointed at the side of her own nose.

Zaraphine crossed her eyes and stretched her tongue out to get the white whipped cream from the fur on her black snout. Once satisfied, she returned to the predicament still caked on the roof of her mouth. After a moment of fighting it with her tongue, she reached in with a clawed finger and scratched the mess free, then swallowed it. She gave the second cake a gluttonous, but apprehensive look.

Adimara grinned charmingly down at her. “I will not tell anyone you do not know how to eat cakes.”

She shoved the cake into her mouth and stood. “Look, Adi—” _smack,_ “Adimara,” _smack, smack,_ “I know how to eat,” _lap, smack, lap,_ “a silly little—”

She smirked and conjured a glass of water, then shoved it into the worgen’s face. “You look like a puppy with peanut butter.” She turned away to continue down the path. “It is kind of cute.”

Zaraphine stopped drinking and straightened indignantly behind her. “ _I am not cute!_ ”

The mage chuckled and disappeared into a large, circular room. A pillar of pale blue-violet light shot upward through the center. Adimara walked slowly, as though her hooves on the purple painted floor might make too much noise and draw foul creatures her way. She paused, staring up the pillar of arcane, trying to see into the chamber above.

“Don’t fall in,” Zaraphine blurted behind her.

She jumped and stumbled forward, then back as the other took her elbow and pulled her away from the speeding and pulsing energies. She laughed as the draenei shoved away from her.

“That is not funny, Zaraphine.” She stomped away toward the door on the other side.

She sobered and stared after her. _So, she really does know my name._ She trotted to catch up. As they passed freshly-slain bodies strewn about the cobblestones, Zaraphine caught Adimara’s eye. “I think we’re on the right track.”

“It would appear to be so.” She lifted the skirt of her robe in one hand to descend the long set of steps.

She followed down the flight of stairs, snuffling cautiously at the air. The draenei made a face, then turned to show it to her.

“Okay, wolf, what’s so—”

“ _Look out!_ ” Zaraphine leapt at the mage, withdrawing her dagger and issuing a command to her demon.

Adimara flinched as the felguard knocked her to the side. He stomped down the stairs, charging headlong into a nightborne before it could reach the mage. The draenei scrambled to her feet, her lips pushed together.

_She saved me…_

Skelgozin used his weight to shove the elf to the floor.

“A little help?” the warlock beside her demanded.

As though snapped from a dream, her arms shot forward to build a bolt of ice between her palms. She launched the projectile over the demon’s back and into the chest of an oncoming nightborne. Skelgozin charged into that one and knocked him to the ground, then swung his axe over and down until the nightborne stopped moving.

As more attackers ran toward the two, Adimara blinked forward. A mist exploded from around her and encased the elves’ feet in ice. One sneered and slashed at her with his double-bladed sword. The mage slipped backward through the air, but not fast enough as the tip of the blade sliced her cheek open. When her hooves returned to where they’d been set just before her blink, she stopped and touched the wound. Her fingers came away red.

_I should’ve been more careful._

The blood trickled down her jaw and left a line of crimson over the pale skin of her neck. The worry over herself diminished, however, when a guard sliced her sword into Zaraphine’s back. She roared in anger and pain as her blood seeped into the black fur, matting it down. The warlock crushed a green rock in her grasp and breathed in some of the fine powder; the bleeding stopped, though the wound didn’t close.

Adimara concentrated and turned one of the guards into a sheep; it bleated and looked around in confusion. She sent a shard of ice into the eye of the nightborne that had cut the worgen. The elf stopped in a moment of shock, dropped her sword, then fell backward onto the hard street, dead. The mage called down a blizzard of sharp icicles, which cut into the exposed flesh of the guards. One unlucky elf caught a sharp barb in her neck; she cried out as blood spurted from the wound, the ice falling away as her warmth melted it. She crumpled to her knees and tipped to her side, a hand uselessly cupped at the wound as she bled out. The frozen group of attackers broke free as the ice weakened. Adimara called forth a ring of freezing air, encasing their feet again. The ethereal weapons were immediately set to hacking at the ice again.

Zaraphine finished off the elf she was fighting by tearing off the entire front of his neck; the man gurgled on his own blood for a moment before he went silent. Panting and bloody, the warlock backed up to stand near the mage. “If you can keep freezing them, Skelgozin and I can take them one at a ti—”

“No. We have to run.”

“That’s quitter talk.”

She pursed her lips at her. “That is survivor talk. Without a healer nearby we do not stand a chance against that many.”

“I said if you could—”

“We cannot! Run!” She shoved at her as the group broke free from the icy detainment.

The worgen dropped onto all fours and nudged the mage onto her back. She scrambled on, a task made difficult by the blood-slicked fur. She carried her down the steps until suddenly the path ended in a sharp drop-off. She spun to glare at the oncoming group. Adimara hopped down and looked around for some sort of saving grace.

“Right, so, here’s the plan—”

“We need to—”

“ _Stop interrupting me, goat!_ ”

She stomped her hoof as her eyes flashed a warning. “Jump.”

“What?”

“Behind us. Jump.”

Zaraphine shook her head. “I’m not jumping anywhere. We can do this, Adimara.”

“Stop being a hot-shot and trust me. Now, _jump!_ ”

Zaraphine growled and spun around, then leapt over the edge. Adimara sent a quick spell to slow her fall, then leapt after her and grabbed onto her back to ride the worgen down onto the broken bridge below.

“Oh. Ha! Clever,” Zaraphine said.

When they landed among their friends, all turned their gazes up to the high section of the bridge. The nightborne collected at the edge, sneering down at the party. However, after a minute they ultimately decided it wasn’t worth the jump, and turned away to return to the palace.

“Oh my gods, Zara, Adi, are you guys okay?” A human in white robes ran forward, settling a quick, golden heal over Adimara’s cut so it would slowly close, then went to Zaraphine to begin working on the many slices in her hide.

“Are you done getting lost and wasting time?” a bored voice asked from behind them. A rogue stood, absently twirling her daggers around her fingers.

“Be nice,” a paladin with a gleaming shield warned.

The rogue shrugged apathetically. “If I’d known we’d be spending so much time standing around, I would’ve just gone to Stormheim.”

His brow lowered and he turned away from the woman. “Zara, you good to go?”

The worgen pushed to her feet and stretched, then shook out her black mane. “Ready as I’ll ever be.”

As the group rushed forward to take their places, Adimara and Zaraphine hesitated. The mage turned to the warlock. She couldn’t be sure, but, the woman looked to be smiling at her. Her lips twitched in a soft smile in return, then they turned and ran forward to meet their party before the towering demon who’d aided in the death of Tirion Fordring. Krosus leered down at them.

“Come then! Meet your end!”


End file.
